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During the Great Depression, the proliferation of local taxpayers’ associations was dramatic and unprecedented. The justly concerned members of these organizations examined the operations of state, city, and county governments, then pressed local officials for operational and fiscal reforms. These associations aimed to reduce the cost of state and local governments to make operations more efficient and less expensive. 
 
“Mr. Taxpayer versus Mr. Tax Spender” presents a comprehensive overview of these grassroots taxpayers’ leagues beginning in the 1860s and shows how they evolved during their heyday in the 1930s. Linda Upham-Bornstein chronicles the ways these taxpayers associations organized as well as the tools they used—constructive economy, political efforts, tax strikes, and tax revolt through litigation—to achieve their objectives.
 
Taxpayer activity was a direct consequence of—and a response to—the economic crisis of the Great Depression and the expansion of the size and scope of government. “Mr. Taxpayer versus Mr. Tax Spender” connects collective tax resistance in the 1930s to the populist tradition in American politics and to other broad impulses in American political and legal history.
 

In this time of social crisis and revolutionary change, words have become one of the key sites of social struggle. Using a framework informed by trans studies, critical race theory, and digital media studies, #Triggered looks at the peak period of progressive social media activism in the U.S. and argues that it is primarily a struggle over whether it is safe for each of us to be ourselves, openly, publicly, proudly, and without permission from the dominant culture.

The term “triggered” and the concept of the trigger warning are just two of many emergent sites of struggle. This book provides a contextual, theoretical history to consider them alongside movements like #BlackLivesMatter, #MeToo, and #TimesUp and concepts like cultural appropriation, “cancel culture,” and safe spaces. These on- and offline struggles have transformed the way we talk, the words we use, and the dominant cultural conversation of race, gender, sexuality, police violence, trauma, and equity. And yet the status quo is still one where marginalized individuals are made to fear for their lives if they do not exhibit the appropriate care and deference. #Triggered invites readers to consider the legitimate complaints about oppressive systems underlying this social crisis, the hierarchy of traumas and subjectivity these movements are opposing, and the opportunity to develop a more open and less repressive society and culture.